Litcham
Litcham is mentioned in the Doomsday Book under the name Licham, Lecham or Leccham as 'a Market Town in the centre of Norfolk'. Other known spellings are Lucham, Lycham, Luychesham to mention but a few.
Edward I granted Litcham the right to hold a weekly market, but it did not thrive and had ceased by 1836. However it has left its mark on the layout of Litcham and is probably the reason why Church Street widens out so dramatically just below All Saints Church.
In Elizabethan times the village was the centre of the local tanning industry. The Collinson and Hallcott families made considerable fortunes and became country squires. The Hallcotts were local benefactors, building almshouses and paying for a church bell. Matthew Hallcott is shown on the village sign with his tanning equipment.
In 1831 its population reached 771, more than a third of these were agricultural workers.
In 1977 it was designated a conservation village and boasts eleven listed buildings plus a church and priory that date back to the 12th century. The village sits astride a major crossroads of country lanes, the most important of which is the B1145 which stretches between King's Lynn and Norwich and was once the King's Lynn – Norwich – Great Yarmouth stagecoach route. Horses would have been changed at the 17th-century Inn, which also served as the local law court until the late 18th century. On the green in front of the Inn there once stood a row of old cottages and a chapel, which were demolished in 1968. The route out of the village on the B1145 towards Mileham passes 'Fourways', a toll house until 1912 and now home to the village museum run by the Litcham Historical Society.